Should India be renamed after Bharat?

[HindaviSwarajya]

Jambudweep was the name when the soil was connected (not parted by water).

Yes you are right, however it was still the whole world.

 

[Bharat Ek Khoj]

Yes you are right, however it was still the whole world.

It also means whole world parted from Jambudweep, bharat, india

 

[Indx TechStyle]

Should India be renamed as Bharat only? Supreme Court to hear plea tomorrow
The constituent assembly adopted two names, India and Bharat for the country after Independence. Many members favoured Bharat as the primary name. A petition is in the Supreme Court now seeking to drop "India" from the Constitution and keep "Bharat" as the only name.

A petition has been filed in the Supreme Court seeking to amend Article 1 of the Constitution and drop "India" as the name of the country keeping only "Bharat" in the official nomenclature.
HIGHLIGHTS

• Supreme Court to hear petition seeking dropping the name "India" from Article 1
• Petitioner cites the constituent assembly debates to back his argument
• The constituent assembly adopted India and Bharat as two names in 1949

"What's in a name," celebrated playwright William Shakespeare had his most famous heroine Juliet say in his Romeo and Juliet play. "That which we call a rose. By any other name would smell as sweet."

But most people wouldn't agree with Shakespeare in their daily lives. For, a name is the most prominent identity of a person, a family, a caste, a religion or a country. Every name has a history.

This was hotly debated in the constituent assembly when India got Independence from British rule. The British called India "India". Before them, the Mughals, the biggest empire in India, called it Hindustan.

After an intense debate, the Constitution adopted two names for the country, India and Bharat. Now, a petition has been filed in the Supreme Court seeking removal of 'India' as the name of the country and keeping just Bharat as the solitary identity of the nation.

The petitioner, Namah - a resident of Delhi, has sought to amend Article 1 of the Constitution, which names the country and defines its territories.

Article 1 (1) of the Constitution reads, India, that is Bharat, shall be a Union of States. The petitioner says the name "India" is a "symbol of slavery" while seeking to recognise "Bharat" or "Hindustan" as the only name for the country.

The petitioner has quoted from the constituent assembly debates to support his arguments in favour of the name change. He has also referred to places whose names were changed over the years.

The constituent assembly debated Article 1 of the then draft constitution prepared under the chairmanship of BR Ambedkar. It was a heated debate that saw sharp exchanges among the members on November 18, 1949 - just eight days before the Constitution was adopted by "We, the people".

The debate opened with HV Kamath, a constituent assembly member from the Central Province and Berar. Kamath objected to the Ambedkar committee's draft that had two names - India and Bharat.

Kamath proposed amendments to Article 1 putting Bharat or alternatively Hind as the primary name for the country and pronouncing India only as the name in the English language.

He went on at length in the constituent assembly to assert that the Namakaran (the naming ceremony) should be taken up more seriously. He enlisted names such as "Hindustan, Hind and Bharatbhumi or Bharatvarsh" to have been suggested by people.

When Kamath began elaborating the origin of the name of Bharat, Brharatbhumi or Bharatvarsh dating it to ancient times, Ambedkar interjected for cutting short his speech.

Kamath snapped back at Ambedkar telling him to let the chairman, Rajendra Prasad run the house. An exchange took place between Prasad and Kamath following which he moved "Bharat" as the amended name for India. Kamath was strongly opposed to the language of Article 1(1) that says, "India that is Bharat".

Another prominent name to oppose the language was Seth Govind Das, who said, "India, that is, Bharat" are not beautiful words for the name of a country. We should have put the words "Bharat known as India also in foreign countries."

Das cited the Vedas, the Mahabharat, couple of Puranas and the writings of Chinese traveller Hiuen-Tsang to say that Bharat was the original name of the country, hence India should not be put as the primary name in the constitution post-independence.

He also invoked Mahatma Gandhi saying that the country fought the battle of freedom raising the slogan of "Bharat Mata Ki Jai" asserting that Bharat could be the only plausible name for the country.

The petitioner cites MA Ayyangar of Madras province as proposing names of Bharat, Bharat Varsha and Hindustan as substitutes for India in Article 1.

Among others who supported India being named only as Bharat included KV Rao from Andhra Pradesh. Rao went to the extent of suggesting that on the basis of historical nomenclature, Pakistan could be named as Hindustan.

He said, "we can now call 'Pakistan as Hindustan because the Indus river is there. Sind has become Hind : as ('sa)' in Sanskrit is pronounced as (Ha) in Prakrit. Greeks pronounced Hind as Ind. Hereafter it is good and proper that we should refer to India as Bharat."

BM Gupta, Sriram Sahai, Kamalapati Tripathi and Har Govind Pant were among other constituent assembly members who vociferously supported India be named only as Bharat. In fact, Tripathi and Ambedkar had some heated exchanges during the debate on naming of the country that day.

Tripathi was going at length to reinforce his point for "Bharat" saying the country was "in bondage for a thousand years, this free country will regain its name" prompting an interjection from Ambedkar asking, "Is this all necessary, Sir?"

At the end, when Rajendra Prasad put the amendments to vote, all fell. Article 1 remained intact as "India, that is Bharat". However, the debate has continued.

In 2014, Yogi Adityanath - the incumbent chief minister of Uttar Pradesh - had moved a Private Member's Bill in the Lok Sabha, seeking substitution of word "India" in the Constitution with "Hindustan" proposing "Bharat" as the primary name of the country.

His bill proposed to amend the language of Article 1 as, "Bharat, that is Hindustan, shall be a Union of States."

The petition for the same comes up for hearing in the Supreme Court on Tuesday.

 

[SKC]

What can Supreme Court decide on this matter. What rights they have with them?

 

[cereal killer]

I don't know whether we should do it coz India is derived from Indus river that means entire PoK & Pakistan is in our claim line & further Tibet too. Bharat has a nice ring to it but I don't know its significance. Ancient India sure as hell wasn't called Bharat.

 

[itsme]

Waste of time, especially now.---------